Friday, October 8, 2010

Yes, Fall is once again upon us and on Cape Cod that means Cranberry Harvest time. Today I noticed that the cranberry growers were harvesting a bog right up the street from my home just a few hundred yards away.

These harvesting machines are kind of interesting as they roll across the cranberry bog chopping off the cranberries from the vines after the bog is flooded. The cranberries then float in the water where they are corralled into the ends of the bog and later loaded up into trucks and carted away to make all sorts of delicious drinks, sauces and jams.

Although these cranberry harvesting machines aren't built for speed they do go quite fast. Why, when I was watching these men work; I swear that one of the machines must have been speeding along at maybe 3 or even up to 4 miles an hour! These very dangerous speeds require that the machine operators take extensive training courses before they are licenced to operate this equipment. I couldn't help but wonder why these daredevils weren't wearing some sort of crash helmets. Oh well, I guess they know what they are doing and just like the danger and excitement of their work.